Sixty-seven of the 110 fires were out of control, according to a local government spokeswoman who said firefighters had spent the night trying to prevent the flames from spreading to homes.

There was no official figure for the area consumed by the fires, which have already killed three people, but the vice president of the regional government, Anxo Quintana, told Cadena Sur radio on Tuesday evening that more than 10,000 hectares (24,710 acres) had been affected.

More than 1,200 soldiers have been sent to the region to help coordinate evacuations and to discourage arsonists, while more than 30 fire-fighting airplanes and several thousand firefighters battled the blazes.

Although Galicia suffers from massive forest fires each year, the regional government said Wednesday that this year's destruction was "unprecedented".

Investigators specialised in organised crime are looking into what Spanish Environment Minister Christina Narbona has called a "wave of arson".

"The situation has worsened despite an increase in resources" to fight the fires, the minister said Wednesday on Cadena Sur.

Five suspected arsonists have been arrested since Monday, one of whom has since been released.

Meanwhile, the death of a 61-year-old farmer in Cordoba, southern Spain, brought the national number of heatwave victims this summer to 16, the regional health ministry said.

Over the border in Portugal, which has also seen high temperatures and a wave of fires since last week, some 600 firefighters battled eight blazes Wednesday, according to the latest official statement.

Most were deployed in the Ossa mountains, in the district of Evora, southern Portugal, where the situation was under control despite the resurgence of a fire overnight Tuesday that had been reported contained.

Around 20 elderly people and children were evacuated.

"We're doing what's necessary to save people's lives and their belongings," said Fernanda Ramos, civil governor of Evora, to Lusa news agency, adding that no homes had burned yet.

More than 220 firefighters were working with around 60 fire engines, a helicopter and an airplane to battle the new outbreak, which has already damaged some 4,000 hectares of eucalyptus forests.

Seven other significant fires have been recorded in the north and centre of Portugal.

Portugal said it would send around 60 firefighters and 19 fire trucks to Galicia to help with efforts there.

"We have a duty of solidarity with Spain, which we have often helped," said Interior Minister Antonio Costa Tuesday during a visit to an emergency operations centre, in comments published in daily Publico on Wednesday.

The group of firefighters are due to work over a period of seven days.

Spanish authorities had asked for air assistance, but Portugal said that, given its own problems with fires, it could not relinquish any aircraft.

Meanwhile a violent fire started Tuesday evening in an illegal rubbish dump in Greece, in the Corinth region, west of Athens, damaging several hundred hectares of forest and arable land, firefighters said Wednesday.

Some 300 hectares have already been burned and three villages were evacuated overnight as a precaution, said Prokopis Byzas, deputy mayor of Evrostinis where the fire broke out.

Some 300 firefighters were battling the blaze along with 80 vehicules, six planes and three helicopters.

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